Club Penguin gets more social with new chat feature

Disney’s super popular, kid friendly virtual world Club Penguin is getting more social thanks to a batch of new features that improve both the chat and friends list functionality in the game.

The new chat system is actually pretty impressive, as it automatically completes words and phrases as players type, making communication quicker and easier. Disney describes it as “one of the safest and most advanced chat technologies for kids.” It features more than 300,000 pre-approved phrases spanning four different languages. You can see it in action in the video below.

The friending in the game has also been tweaked, as players can now have best friends, search for friends by username, and have their own penguin avatar show up in friends lists. And coming soon is a feature that lets players automatically jump to wherever their friends may be in the game.

“We’ve added powerful social networking technologies to the world’s biggest online world for kids, making it much easier for kids to find and connect with each other in Club Penguin,” Lane Merrifield, co-founder of Club Penguin and executive vice president of Disney Online Studios, explained.

“The new friends and chat systems are the most significant enhancements we’ve ever made to Club Penguin and we’re just getting started.”

The new features will begin slowly rolling out to players today, and should to everyone within a few weeks.